Can robots ever be graceful?

"To bring a robot to life, motion-activating components, or actuators, are essential. Generally speaking, actuators can either go in and out, or spin around in a circle, and there are many different ways of doing this. Combining actuators with artificial bodies or limbs allows you to create things like a robot arm, a robot dog or a humanoid. If robots are to become more sophisticated, they will have to have more efficient, more precise and more intelligent actuators."

"To make it happen, he needed to build four powerful legs for the so-called At-At which famously first appeared in The Empire Strikes Back that he could control with some precision. "I don't want something that's massive and wobbly," he explains, justifiably. And so Bruton came up with an intricate system of motors and gears, to function as servos, moving parts whose position can be monitored and controlled."

James Bruton built a giant walking AT-AT replica and rode it while refining leg mechanisms capable of precise control. He designed an intricate system of motors and gears functioning as servos to monitor and control limb position. He is developing components described as variable springs that can reverse and absorb ground impact dynamically. Robots require motion-activating components called actuators, which typically translate linear or rotary motion. Combining actuators with artificial bodies enables robot arms, dogs, or humanoids. More sophisticated robots demand actuators that are more efficient, precise, and intelligent. Few firms can mass-manufacture such high-precision actuators, which remain far from biological muscle performance.

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